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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23995645">Beyond the Mask</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/arnor/pseuds/arnor'>arnor</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Batman: Arkham (Video Games), DCU (Comics), Nightwing (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Under the Red Hood</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Age of Consent, Character(s) of Color, Civilian/Vigilante encounters, Consent, Drabble Collection, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I'll add more character tags when I write more drabbles, LGBTQ Character of Color, No underage shit, Other, Swearing, Unreliable Narrator, Violence, oneshots</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 21:20:41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>964</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23995645</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/arnor/pseuds/arnor</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>there's no official guide for what to expect in a relationship with a vigilante.</p><p>it's not like you can google this. you already tried. </p><p>and, beside the occasional film review, a dubious academic paper about the combination of magic and technology in today's modern world, or overly romanticized quizzes about which hero is your soulmate, you, as expected, got <i>nothing</i> of worthwhile relevance to your situation.</p><p>maybe you'd make start one, and set the groundworks for any and all civilians living a shared, yet very unique, experience.</p><p>(or: a drabble collection as to why civilians and members of the batfamily should most <i>certainly</i> engage with each other during curfew hours and after.)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Dick Grayson/Reader, Dick Grayson/You, Jason Todd/Reader, Jason Todd/You, Nightwing/You, Red Hood/You, Red Robin/You, Tim Drake/Reader, Tim Drake/You</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>63</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. the variance, with jason todd. [slight nsfw]</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>works may be edited from their original tumblr source.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>you, jason todd thinks, sever his fucking nerves.</p><p>the thing is, he doesn’t know how if he can describe what you do to him, this... sensation every time your body's so much near his.

there’s a rush of coldness coveting his body like a blanket, driving him to be around you for indulgence’s sake.</p><p>jason can't—won't—rid himself of the ice, if only to be frazzled with your fingers on his skin, making him feel the chill and the warmth all at once; it almost makes him feel alive and fucking worth it.</p><p>he’d be damned if he ever told you. </p><p>this is one secret—one of many—he will shut in his pandora’s box.</p><p>you carry on, in your own way, the only way you know to. </p><p>he can almost grasp at your fear the way he does his. you don’t have to know he finds himself choking in it on the daily.</p><p>your head is high, your eyes vibrant, and your voice, sure. you may not know how to hold a gun, defend yourself with a knife—he’d have to remedy this, despite your probable protests—but you fight the world anyway.</p><p>“missed me?”</p><p>“never,” you retort, but the raised corner of your mouth gives you and your lie away.</p><p>...</p><p>ah.</p><p><i>shit</i>.</p><p>you shuffle for two seconds before you find your footing on top of him, one leg on either side. he grasps at your hips, toiled fingers on soft skin, pulling you closer as you coil your arms around his neck. you push against his jeans in retaliation, and jason feels himself pulsating, swelling, the fabric of his jeans chafing at the intolerable. he’ll have to change that soon.</p><p>you press on him, moving like his pendulum; forward and back, forward and back, before you two meet at the middle. you curl into him, wet mouth on the outer shell of his ear.</p><p>

fuck—what's going on? how's he almost bursting at this point? already? why's his pants still on? <i>why even wear pants?</i> fuck.</p><p>your wetness is sensitive against his; he’s pretty sure you know he’s not exactly dry at the seams.</p><p>“could've fooled me,” jason murmurs lowly as you pull at his skin with your teeth with care. even with his head tilted, he can feel your breath managing to meet the inside of his ear. while one hand's still buried in his hair, your other finds itself palming him, rubbing against familiar humidity.</p><p>

jason's one brain cell away from forgetting everything: where he is, what time it is, hell, even who the fuck he is. everything, besides you. never you.</p><p>your fingers toy with his belt before they unclasp the stupid toggle. the curve of your lips is unmistakable, especially when it's pressed on his temple.</p><p>while jason may have lost the battle, this is one defeat he can acquiesce to.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>is jason todd <i>really</i> jason todd if he doesn't constantly skirt the line between craving affection and love while simultaneously self-sabotaging himself of his desires?</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. this, that & maybe, with tim drake.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>there's no official guide for what to expect in a relationship with a vigilante.</p><p>it's not like you can google this. you already tried.</p><p>and, beside the occasional film review, a dubious academic paper about the combination of magic and technology in today's modern world, or overly romanticized quizzes about which hero is your soulmate, you, as expected, got nothing of worthwhile relevance to your situation.</p><p>maybe you'd make start one, and set the groundworks for any and all civilians living a shared, yet very unique, experience.</p><p>your ambitious smile, so large and emboldened under the striking brightness of your screen, should have spilled onto the floor. and even if it had—under superfluous circumstances basically turning unconventional occurrences into the new normal—tim wouldn’t have minded, not for one millisecond.</p><p>sanity is a privilege, and wreckage, palpitating to the core. </p><p>there's as much to gain in gotham as there is plenty to be lost.</p><p>can be. </p><p>was.</p><p>how could he make you truly begin to understand that your life is now embedded in the shadow of his own? </p><p>that his victories are yours?</p><p>that they are a living testament that has left you untouched, safe, and lucid?</p><p>or that any of his failures will bleed him dry in the shroud of repeated misery?</p><p>all is needed is one slip, one mistake, one blind spot...</p><p>gotham's walls told stories. they shivered softly with every stomp, groaned against pressure, and shuddered from lack of constant constraint, crevicing thin strokes of black against the smallest of lusters. </p><p>

his tale was not written for the darkness, but for it, surrounding the imprint of the city that bore him and carved his arms to weightless and weightful wings, you were no robin; you may not be able to soar, but you could most certainly glide, even as the world explodes. you've done it once, under the axe of an assassin who bore their teeth out at him, taunting death. you'll do it again. you need to.</p><p>or maybe he's just an idiotic uber-idealist. 
</p><p>maybe a little. 
</p><p>... maybe a lot.
</p><p>and maybe, you simply can't. luck alone is too risky to rely on.

</p><p>which is why he won't convince you: he can't, if only to convince <i>himself </i> his hope is more than just a lofty promise of possibility. which is <i>also</i> why he doesn't have a microtracker installed in your person that you don't know about; because if you did, you might not punch his eyes out bloody and blue, and he does need those.</p><p>

<i>this</i> is the truth; he won't deny the veracity of his statement, the burgeoning testament of his own selfish, damned, making.</p><p>as beguiling nineties david fincher as it sounds—you are his strength, and therefore a weakness, one no one will ever touch.

</p><p>because, despite all the potential responses to all of his internal questions, there is only one viable, real, answer truly worth knowing:</p><p> you.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>it would be maddening if tim wasn't afraid (he is), but more maddening if he <i>didn't</i> fight the fear (he does).</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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